Quantifying the profile and progression of impairments, activity, participation, and quality of life in people with Parkinson disease : protocol for a prospective cohort study

Background Despite the finding that Parkinson disease (PD) occurs in more than one in every 1000 people older than 60 years, there have been few attempts to quantify how deficits in impairments, activity, participation, and quality of life progress in this debilitating condition. It is unclear which tools are most appropriate for measuring change over time in PD. Methods and design This protocol describes a prospective analysis of changes in impairments, activity, participation, and quality of life over a 12 month period together with an economic analysis of costs associated with PD. One-hundred participants will be included, provided they have idiopathic PD rated I-IV on the modified Hoehn & Yahr (1967) scale and fulfil the inclusion criteria. The study aims to determine which clinical and economic measures best quantify the natural history and progression of PD in a sample of people receiving services from the Victorian Comprehensive Parkinson\u27s Program, Australia. When the data become available, the results will be expressed as baseline scores and changes over 3 months and 12 months for impairment, activity, participation, and quality of life together with a cost analysis. Discussion This study has the potential to identify baseline characteristics of PD for different Hoehn & Yahr stages, to determine the influence of disease duration on performance, and to calculate the costs associated with idiopathic PD. Valid clinical and economic measures for quantifying the natural history and progression of PD will also be identified

Pillarization and Islam: Church-state traditions and Muslim claims for recognition in the Netherlands

Public policy responses to Muslim immigration in the Netherlands are often presented as crucially shaped by ‘pillarization’. This article takes issue with this perception by challenging two related assumptions. On the one hand, that the Dutch church-state model is essentially about pillarization and, on the other, the idea that strategies of pillarization were applied to accommodate Muslim immigrant groups. The latter claim comprises three main hypotheses: first, that there actually exists an Islamic pillar in the Netherlands; second, that the forming of an Islamic pillar was a policy objective; and third, that pillarization shaped institutional and discursive opportunities for the institutionalization of Islam. On the basis of a reconstruction of public policy over 35 years, the article concludes that pillarization did not play this crucial role in shaping the development of Islam in the Netherlands

Obinutuzumab plus Chlorambucil in Patients with CLL and Coexisting Conditions

Background The monoclonal anti-CD20 antibody rituximab, combined with chemotherapeutic agents, has been shown to prolong overall survival in physically fit patients with previously untreated chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) but not in those with coexisting conditions. We investigated the benefit of the type 2, glycoengineered antibody obinutuzumab (also known as GA101) as compared with that of rituximab, each combined with chlorambucil, in patients with previously untreated CLL and coexisting conditions. Methods We randomly assigned 781 patients with previously untreated CLL and a score higher than 6 on the Cumulative Illness Rating Scale (CIRS) (range, 0 to 56, with higher scores indicating worse health status) or an estimated creatinine clearance of 30 to 69 ml per minute to receive chlorambucil, obinutuzumab plus chlorambucil, or rituximab plus chlorambucil. The primary end point was investigator-assessed progression-free survival. Results The patients had a median age of 73 years, creatinine clearance of 62 ml per minute, and CIRS score of 8 at baseline. Treatment with obinutuzumab-chlorambucil or rituximab-chlorambucil, as compared with chlorambucil monotherapy, increased response rates and prolonged progression-free survival (median progression-free survival, 26.7 months with obinutuzumab-chlorambucil vs. 11.1 months with chlorambucil alone; hazard ratio for progression or death, 0.18; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.13 to 0.24; P<0.001; and 16.3 months with rituximab-chlorambucil vs. 11.1 months with chlorambucil alone; hazard ratio, 0.44; 95% CI, 0.34 to 0.57; P<0.001). Treatment with obinutuzumab-chlorambucil, as compared with chlorambucil alone, prolonged overall survival (hazard ratio for death, 0.41; 95% CI, 0.23 to 0.74; P = 0.002). Treatment with obinutuzumab-chlorambucil, as compared with rituximab-chlorambucil, resulted in prolongation of progression-free survival (hazard ratio, 0.39; 95% CI, 0.31 to 0.49; P<0.001) and higher rates of complete response (20.7% vs. 7.0%) and molecular response. Infusion-related reactions and neutropenia were more common with obinutuzumab-chlorambucil than with rituximab-chlorambucil, but the risk of infection was not increased. Conclusions Combining an anti-CD20 antibody with chemotherapy improved outcomes in patients with CLL and coexisting conditions. In this patient population, obinutuzumab was superior to rituximab when each was combined with chlorambucil

Political and institutional influences on the use of evidence in public health policy. A systematic review.

BACKGROUND: There is increasing recognition that the development of evidence-informed health policy is not only a technical problem of knowledge exchange or translation, but also a political challenge. Yet, while political scientists have long considered the nature of political systems, the role of institutional structures, and the political contestation of policy issues as central to understanding policy decisions, these issues remain largely unexplored by scholars of evidence-informed policy making. METHODS: We conducted a systematic review of empirical studies that examined the influence of key features of political systems and institutional mechanisms on evidence use, and contextual factors that may contribute to the politicisation of health evidence. Eligible studies were identified through searches of seven health and social sciences databases, websites of relevant organisations, the British Library database, and manual searches of academic journals. Relevant findings were extracted using a uniform data extraction tool and synthesised by narrative review. FINDINGS: 56 studies were selected for inclusion. Relevant political and institutional aspects affecting the use of health evidence included the level of state centralisation and democratisation, the influence of external donors and organisations, the organisation and function of bureaucracies, and the framing of evidence in relation to social norms and values. However, our understanding of such influences remains piecemeal given the limited number of empirical analyses on this subject, the paucity of comparative works, and the limited consideration of political and institutional theory in these studies. CONCLUSIONS: This review highlights the need for a more explicit engagement with the political and institutional factors affecting the use of health evidence in decision-making. A more nuanced understanding of evidence use in health policy making requires both additional empirical studies of evidence use, and an engagement with theories and approaches beyond the current remit of public health or knowledge utilisation studies

The politics of security lists

The List, one of the most archaic means of written enumeration and classification, has made a forceful recurrence in the post-9/11 global security landscape. From terrorist sanctions lists and No-Fly lists to “kill-lists” for drone warfare; from the privately compiled lists of risky banking clients to the regulatory lists of untrustworthy or incompliant companies, the list seems to proliferate as a contemporary technology of security and regulation. How and why are lists becoming newly embedded in security practices? What work do lists perform as specific techniques of government and forms of normative ordering? And what consequences follow for how problems of legal accountability and political responsibility are currently understood and addressed? This paper frames security lists as inscription devices that are heterogeneous, unpredictable and productive in unforeseen ways. It draws attention to the ways they materialise the categories they purport to describe, and how they enact novel forms of knowledge, jurisdiction and targeting. We suggest that critiques could be strengthened by making visible and contesting the fragmented and diffuse conditions through which security lists are produced

A relação da postura corporal com a prosódia na doença de parkinson: estudo de caso The relations between body posture and prosody in Parkinson's disease: case study

OBJETIVO: investigar a associação entre a postura corporal e a prosódia em indivíduos com Doença de Parkinson. MÉTODOS: estudo de corte transversal realizado com cinco sujeitos com Doença de Parkinson da cidade de Santa Maria, Estado do Rio Grande do Sul, em 2006. Utilizaram-se avaliações da prosódia lingüística e emocional bem como da postura corporal. A análise estatística utilizada foi descritiva. RESULTADOS: foram estudados quatro sujeitos do sexo masculino e um sujeito do sexo feminino com idades entre 37 e 53 anos. Três sujeitos encontravam-se no estágio I, um sujeito no estágio III e um sujeito no estágio IV da doença conforme a escala de classificação da função motora Hohen &Yahr, todos sob o uso de medicação e apresentando os sinais da tríade característica da patologia (rigidez, tremor, bradicinesia) bem como as alterações posturais típicas. Na comparação entre prosódia emocional e prosódia lingüística, encontrou-se melhor desempenho na prosódia emocional e não se evidenciou associação entre os estágios da patologia e alterações na postura corporal e prosódia. CONCLUSÃO: as alterações posturais são sinais característicos da Doença de Parkinson, assim como alterações na prosódia lingüística e emocional. A ocorrência de alterações posturais foi elevada entre os parkinsonianos. Os sujeitos apresentaram melhor performance na prosódia emocional. Não houve evidências de que os estágios da doença estivessem associados às alterações da prosódia e da postura corporal.<br>PORPOSE: to investigate the relationship between body posture and prosody in patients with Parkinson Disease. METHODS: the study was carried out with five patients (four males and one female) from Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, by means of cross-section study, in 2006. Evaluations of linguistic and emotional prosody as well as analysis of body posture were carried out. The statistical analysis was descriptive. RESULTS: the subjects of this study were four men and one woman aged between 37 and 53 years. Three of these patients were classified in stage I of the disease; one in the stage III and the other one in the stage IV, according to the classification of Hohen & Yahr motor function. All of them were under medication and presenting the signals of the characteristic triad of such pathology: rigidity, tremor and bradykinesia, as well as the typical alterations of body posture. In the comparison between linguistic prosody and emotional prosody, subjects showed the best performance in emotional prosody and no associations among the stages of the disease and the alterations on body posture and prosody were evidenced. CONCLUSION: body posture alterations are the characteristic signals of Parkinson Disease as well as the disorders related to linguistic and emotional prosody. The occurrence of posture alterations was high in patients with Parkinson disease. Subjects showed better performance in emotional prosody. There were no evidences that the stages of the disease were related to prosody or body posture alterations